[anonHash]

Pet peeve. Colloquially people call it, the Byzantine empire, or Byzantium but this is an error. It was always the Roman empire. a German historian in 1500s popularized by Louis XIV library retold the story of the Roman empire, as having broken up into the eastern and western Roman Empire, but in reality, the western and eastern empire never did officially split.

The German goths conquered Italy but chose to remain part of the Roman empire. The Roman emperor at the time was a child. The Goths sent him the the purple cape, purple being a color of kings.

The Roman historian who retold the story in the 16th century told it after the conquest of Constantinople. This retelling made it seem that the Roman Empire was succeeded by the German Goths, as the Holy Roman Empire. Either he did to throw shade at the Ottoman Empire as not being the real successors. Or he did this because he was a catholic, and the Roman Catholic Church had a problem with the Eastern Orthodox Churches and had been excommunicated by them as well as excommunicated them (until the 20th century). Or both.

His narrative led to the coining of terms East and West, something that continues today (aka western world). Pejoratively Eastern Europe is just alien to Western Europe as the “Eastern world”, hence why Ukraine gets so much flack.

He named the “Eastern Roman empire” as the “Byzantine” empire. This Byzantium term had not been used since ancient history preceding the Roman Empire. (It’s like calling northeast America as the Iroquois States, or midwest US as the French Plains, or southwestern US as the Mexican States.) Byzantium was the name that preceded Constantinople.

The eastern Roman Empire always called themselves the Roman Empire and claimed the territories of the western Roman Empire.

Now only if I could find the name of this historian.

[jmyeet]

While Byzantium was still somewhat Roman it was also something distinct. For one thing the official language right up until the Fall of Constantinpole was Byzantine Greek not Latin.

so it may be true that the Goths in Italy were Romanized (as had repeatedly happened with conquerors, interestingly), the empire that remains after the Fall of Rome was, in total, different in character, culture, language and territory.

[ffgjgf1]

The official language did not change to Greek until the empire nearly collapsed as a result of the plague, Persian wars and the Arab invasion.

The state that emerged from this was were different to the Roman Empire rules by Justinian in many ways.

> after the Fall of Rome was

I would disagree that was the case in the 500s, the Fall of Rome was mostly seamless and most actual changes occurred years later.

[srcreigh]

I'm ok with this re-writing. It would be confusing to call 800's Italy/France and 800's Turkey both "Roman Empire". We need different names for those places, even if the residents of the places used the same name for themselves.

Nobody really says that the people at that time called themselves Byzantine, anyways. I've heard some derogatory remarks about the phrase "Holy Roman Empire" though - that it wasn't holy nor Roman nor an empire. But it serves as a name which is useful.

[georgeplusplus]

>>>> 800's Turkey

The Byzantines primary language was Greek. Followed by Latin, and included most of what is today, modern Turkey.

Turkey was not even a thought at that time. Calling it Turkish would be appropriation of the Greek culture.

[srcreigh]

I'm Eastern Orthodox, so trust me, I know.

Did you know Istanbul is the same word as Constantinople? It's like a slang version.

I'm probably talking to a Greek person, so I can't really say anything smart and not offend you. Kyrie eleison Kyrie eleison kyrie eleison... ;-)

[ithkuil]

"εἰς τὴν Πόλιν" ?

[jtbarrett]

> Now only if I could find the name of this historian.

Is it Hieronymus Wolf? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hieronymus_Wolf

[anonHash]

Yes it was!

[causality0]

The German goths conquered Italy but chose to remain part of the Roman empire.

Did they continue paying taxes? Was the military under the control of the Roman emperor? Did they maintain the road linkages and postal service between the Eastern and Western halves of the empire?

[ffgjgf1]

Even before the official collapse the western half hardly had any of these.

The Goths who took Italy for themselves were infact the army of the Western Empire which was basically dead for years now.

The Gothic king simply realized that there was no point in pretending anymore and just decided he’d rather be a ‘vassal’ of the emperor in Constantinople than have his own emperor in Ravenna.

The Goths actually left the local Romans to themselves in general the power of the senate in Rome possibly even increased during the period cause they were no in charge of the Latin population who were still governed by a separate law code to that of the Germans.

[vondur]

Nope to all of those. The Goths under Theoderic paid lip service to the Emperor in Constantinople to keep the Roman elite on board. There were two law codes, one for Romans and one for Goths.

[edgyquant]

You’re not wrong about the name Byzantium but you are dead wrong about East/West being a later invention. The Romans themselves split it along these lines and even had an emperor for each half before Constantine.

[ffgjgf1]

They didn’t really consider these two halves to be separate states, the empire was viewed as universal and indivisible by most.

Having multiple emperors was perfectly acceptable though, if not entirely practical most of the time.

[nindalf]

The point you could be missing is that while there was an administrative split, the folks living in the East still considered themselves Roman citizens. Which they were, in law.

[georgeplusplus]

I always thought it had more to do with Western Rome aligning with Catholicism vs Orthodox Christianity of eastern Rome and the Great Schism causing early historians and conquerors alike to solidify boundaries between the two.

[namaria]

Great comment. But I have to disagree with "His narrative led to the coining of terms East and West, something that continues today (aka western world). Pejoratively Eastern Europe is just alien to Western Europe as the “Eastern world”, hence why Ukraine gets so much flack."

The current concept of Eastern Europe is firmly grounded on the notion of Cold War. The concept of Eastern Roman Empire has nothing to do with Eastern Communist Europe. I think your jump in connecting both strands is not at all justified.